Quote Originally Posted by Spiritwind
Nope.. you might have seen a sable merle and THOUGHT it was a red merle.. but rough and smooth collies do not come in red merle. A blue merle is a black dog with the dilute (merle gene).. which creates the blue/silver color. A red merle is a liver/red dog with the merle gene. Collies do not come in red/liver. However Aussies and Border Collies do.

Some sable merles can apppear redish, depending on how dark the sable is. But most sable merles are a light golden/straw color.. as puppies you can see the merling, but usually as adults they loose the merling and just look like a very light sable. Of course their are acceptions, like ParNones smooth Oz, who is a very obvious sable merle, and did not loose the merling as an adult...

Janna
While I am quite familiar with what the merle genes are, what causes them, and what breed gets them, I am a little bit weirded out that rough and smooth collies do not get the red merle. In The Complete Encyclopedia of Dogs, Esther Verhoef-Verhallen wrote the book to FCI standards and says that sable merle includes a wide range of colours including red. Argh! So confused! XD